Palin was joined by other major tea party favorites such as Sen. Mike Lee of Utah and Rep. Steve King of Iowa, as well as conservative intellectual and activist Phyllis Schlafly at the Iowa Faith and Freedom Coalition’s Annual Family Banquet.The return of Sarah Palin

Palin has flirted with politics repeatedly since she left office halfway through her first term in Alaska, including a turbulent 2012 non-campaign for the Republican presidential nomination that she eventually abandoned.

In the important primary state, Palin spent the first part of her speech blasting the “war on Christmas” by secular society that she argues is stripping all public meaning from the holiday by opposing nativity scenes and other displays.

“Everywhere it seems that faith, religious freedom is under attack,” Palin said.

Those same topics are discussed in a new book Palin wrote called “Good Tidings and Great Joy: Protecting the Heart of Christmas,” a book for which she is currently on a national tour and that she discussed Saturday.

“The war on Christmas is just the tip of the spear in a larger battle,” Palin said, segueing into a discussion of what she sees as big government’s efforts to become a church in its own right.

That “church,” Palin said, comprises largely of President Barack Obama’s administration and scandals plaguing it such as NSA spying and the terrorist attack on the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi last year.

“The crowning achievement of their church of big government,” Palin said, is Obamacare.

More should have been done to destroy Obama’s signature legislative achievement, Palin said, blasting Republicans who “waved the white flag of surrender” and gave up on the defund movement.

Palin also had words for the national debt, particularly the $1.3 trillion the U.S. owes China.

“It’s going to be like slavery when that note is due,” Palin said, while noting at the same time that the comparison “isn’t racist”

Like the rest of the event’s speakers, Palins words were deeply rooted in a Christian faith.

In her opposition to Obamacare, Palin was in good company. Lee was one of the key architects of the movement to defund the health care law that helped precipitate the partial government shutdown when Democrats flatly refused to pass a government funding bill that also sought to destroy Obamacare.

Lee carried a similar mantle Saturday to that of his better known anti-Obamacare ally, GOP Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas. Like Cruz, Lee likened the Reagan revolution to the tea party movement, drawing comparisons to the original Boston Tea Party that preceded the American Revolution.

Lee compared the British government that the fledgling colonies fought 230 years ago with the Washington of today, a government “slow to respond to the needs to the people,” he said, people who are overtaxed and little listened too.

Conservatives should not be purely reactionary, Lee cautioned in a broad rallying cry of a speech. Rather, Republicans should focus on moving forward, he said, not just repealing Obamacare but replacing it with something better while instituting other forward-looking reforms such as establishing a path for upward social mobility.

Cruz highlighted the “road to Philadelphia” and the Constitutional Convention. Instead of just moving away from the government they didn’t want, Lee said of the Founding Fathers, they were “moving steadily, inexorably in the direction of the kind of government they did want.”

soundoff(583 Responses)

Fools

Who is gonna believe this shrilly tea bagger terrorist?

November 10, 2013 09:32 am at 9:32 am |

Hoping for Sarah

Please, Sarah – PLEASE run. Please run and pull every available string and dirty trick you have to get the nomination so that we can FINALLY be done with you and your idiot "Tea Party". You won't win, but you probably wouldn't finish out your term anyway.

This woman is as dumb as Bachman. Go back to the state that you abandoned.

November 10, 2013 09:36 am at 9:36 am |

Cory111

It appears the wardrobe McGrump bought her is losing it's luster so she is out looking for a new one.
Maybe Cruz will accommodate they would make a great team, "Seemore & Doolittle."
Hillary 2016

November 10, 2013 09:37 am at 9:37 am |

1twinsfan

Palin now sounds like Charlie Brown's teacher. Waa waa waa waa.

November 10, 2013 09:38 am at 9:38 am |

Jerrie

Way to amp up the base: Define differences between you and your opponent as a religious struggle.

Does no one in politics ever lose points for socially destructive tactics?

November 10, 2013 09:38 am at 9:38 am |

Gary

Anyone take the moment to look at that aging crowd? Also Seeing the Picture of our first President defaced with a tear, when I'll take a bet that not a single one knows about President Washington's background, beliefs, and what he stood for.
Where is that war of Christmas by the way? Seems to me that the Christian Religion is still going strong $$$

November 10, 2013 09:39 am at 9:39 am |

Chris

I just want to know what in the hell is a "intellectual conservative" is? Those two words do not go together.

November 10, 2013 09:40 am at 9:40 am |

Siestasis

Schaflay and Palin, two of the three witches of the GOP. The first sentence should read Former part time governor of Alaska "I quit to make money" Palin.

What a modern day witch she is! Every time she has a book to sell she appears on the national stage to advertise it. She has discovered a way to keep making money. She pays someone to write a book about something trivial and then she makes a lot of profit by selling it like this. We all remember from her 2008 VP campaign that she is an ignorant and uneducated person. This does not speak about Palin only, it speaks about those who actually listen to her and buy her books.

November 10, 2013 09:42 am at 9:42 am |

Rick

War on Christmas? She's insane. Meanwhile she's a leader of war on Gays and immigrants and teachers and everyone who is not tea party like Obama.

November 10, 2013 09:43 am at 9:43 am |

max cady

A "Iowa gathering"
in other words a gathering of brainless incestious liars

November 10, 2013 09:44 am at 9:44 am |

Jim

Nice to see she has a handle on the important issues...

November 10, 2013 09:45 am at 9:45 am |

Wes Scott

Who is this Sarah Palin I keep hearing about every now and then? She sounds like a woman scorned (by the whole world!)

November 10, 2013 09:45 am at 9:45 am |

Randy, San Francisco

Great to see Sarah Palin still relevant and influential in the Republican Tea Party. This means the rebranding of the Republican brand is going nowhere fast. Good news for Hillary in 2016!

November 10, 2013 09:47 am at 9:47 am |

Jim

Hasn't this disease been wiped out yet?

November 10, 2013 09:47 am at 9:47 am |

itzmeman

In the famous words of Patsy Cline, "Crazy"

November 10, 2013 09:49 am at 9:49 am |

Rich

Yet another rant from a do-nothing, never-accomplished anything, half-term governor who CRAVES the spotlight. This is the same woman who thought the U.s. and North Korea were allies. She's constantly looking for a spotlight to spew her nonsense. We can do better than Sarah Palin – she's out for Sarah and folks, there is no there there.